


Drawn (on a Rough Canvas)

by Lessandra



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-30
Updated: 2013-07-30
Packaged: 2017-12-21 21:01:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/904880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lessandra/pseuds/Lessandra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thought of Captain America as an artist strikes him as the pinnacle of hilarious. The drawing session that follows that little discovery, however, bears some unexpected fruit.</p><p>(Or the one, in which there is a constant battle of egos, and Tony might have a plan about Steve, and Steve is perfectly aware of that but goes along with it anyway. Also, Steve draws which is all kinds of hilarious until it’s really really not.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drawn (on a Rough Canvas)

**Author's Note:**

> It was supposed to be a PWP one-shot, but 20 pages in with no ‘p0rn’ having started I was forced to face the fact that my writing PWPs (or one-shots) is probably never gonna happen. It’s still supposed to be hot, though. :P Somewhat ridiculous, but definitely hot.

_His workshop is like a separate pocket of the universe that is made fit exactly for him; where only perfect things exist. (It’s only right this should be occurring here as well.) It is an endless supply of materials to play with, it is computers so hardcore they would give Hammer jaundice. It is music so obscenely loud that people unused to it feel their eardrums dislodging from their heads. It is Jarvis, wherever Tony would be without him. It is Iron Man suits (naturally), none of which feel like his Gioconda yet, but he’s got all the time and all the patience (a concept people find surprising that he’s familiar with) and all the single-minded self-serving obsession in the world to continue polishing the design until it’s flawless._

_There are no fundraisers, no publically appropriate decisions to make, nor the constant weight of social stigma that he adheres to in his charmingly rule-breaking manner. No people he has to please with his wit and talent and vast amounts of finesse and other things he’s never modest about (you wouldn’t think so, but the image of a good-for-nothing playboy takes hard work to uphold), because here he doesn’t need the reinforcing ego boost — in his lab he’s entirely self-sufficient._

_He can walk into his workshop on Monday morning and emerge Wednesday night without realizing he’s been gone for two days because it is his private piece of nirvana._  
_Today it is his hell._  
_It is under invasion—_  
_—even as superficially everything remains intact._

 _It is disturbingly silent, filled with half-surreal noises of the machinery hum, the whisper of air conditioning and the sharp, vexing_ scratching, and crackling, and rustling _that deafen him more than the music of brothers Young ever has._

_Time crawls like a lazy drop of melting butter over barely sloping glass, clock hands moving at the third of their usual speed, driving him insane._

_He is more wired than he usually gets when he’s working on his tech, aware of every cramp and soreness in his muscles, of rippling desire to shift, of drops of sweat trickling down his neck and spine that have nothing to do with the temperature because Jarvis is responsible for regulating that, and the dude is faultless._

_Steve raises his head to look at him._

 

 

**1.**

**draw** /drɔ:/  
_verb (past **drew** /dru:/; past participle **drawn** /drɔ:n/)_  
**1.** _[with an adverbial of direction]_ pull or guide someone gently to a specific direction

 

It starts off as something completely harmless and entirely inconsequential. Of course, ‘inconsequential’ by Tony Stark’s standards may be the equivalent of a minor civil war in some cultures. Thankfully, the standards of the Avengers Initiative are equally obliging.

So, inconsequential might have included testing his new blasters on Captain America’s shield — harmless in itself, you understand, were it not in the middle of a mission, resulting in an uncalculated destruction of two storeys of a nearby building after the Captain retaliated by hurling the said shield at him like a freaking Olympic discus thrower, which on collision with the Mark XII (now defunct) caused unexpected overclocking of all systems. All pure accidents, you see. Explained with appropriate maturity in subsequent mission reports.

It might have also included dropping the diplomatic approach in favor of provoking hostile actions, because diplomacy is less fun than continued testing of the Avengers’ limits — that is, until the limit is reached elsewhere, and Cap throws his suitless ass into the Hulk-cage aboard the Hellcarrier to make sure he follows Director Fury’s instruction to “sit this one out”.

It definitely included making up the scale of Most to Least Powerful Avenger on their off day, which naturally included sparring matches between him in his Iron Man suit, Thor, the Cap and Hulked-out Banner. Fury made _Stark Industries_ cover the destruction caused on his base that day. It wasn’t pretty. Pepper didn’t speak to him for days.

Oh, and there was that time when they started a revolt in an obscure Tibetan region after Tony pointed out that their magical Buddhist artifact was in fact of Asgardian origin, which prompted Thor to immediately demand its return. The monks broke their veto on violence specifically for them. Yeah. That was fun.

But that’s just who they are. Tony can’t help the snarky remarks and the overall air of arrogance, and Steve has never enough patience for it. That’s both puzzling and irritating, seeing as he overlooks the faults in everybody else. (Mighty generous of him, too, because of course Mr. Epitome-of-the-American-Dream is bloody impeccable.)

But Steve’s not patient with Tony. He finds it briefly offensive before Pepper rightfully points out that no one is capable of being ‘patient’ with Tony. He turns it into a point of amusement afterwards: that he is apparently the only person with enough vitriol to light Captain Virtue’s head on fire.

So yeah, it starts in the zone of inconsequentially exasperating with occasional bursts of keen desire to wreck violence, all mostly directed at Tony (and accompanied by Natasha’s resigned _‘I-told-you-so’_ s afterwards, because she did, she did tell them so in her profile, and hiring him in spite of it is a gamble Fury probably regrets to this day).

It proceeds with the development of obligatory ego-clashing. And you wouldn’t think Captain Leaves-No-Man-Behind has an ego when he’s saving kittens from trees and puts everyone’s interests before his own, but when Tony is concerned he promptly grows one. He meets every insult with an answering one of growing proportions, and when Tony pushes, Steve shoves as good as he gets — mostly by way of verbal arguments, but at times in a less metaphorical sense, which always ends up expensive on Tony’s pocket money. But it is exhilarating.

Thing is, despite Natasha’s occasional unsubtle hints and even less subtle glares, indicating that he should go easy on the esteemed war hero, Tony never sought his approval or friendship. He never actively sought those things from anyone, and the friends he’s stuck with are his by virtue of their own tolerance and understanding, and definitely not his merit. He had zero intention of going easy on Steve Rogers, mainly because he thought that was actually the last thing the guy wanted — people prancing around him like he’s gonna break. So Tony did not treat him as a friend, or a collegue, or even a trauma victim, but he did treat him as an equal (whatever that implies in Tony Stark’s flexible thesaurus), heard him out but hardly ever listened, argued and fought on every turn, and that must have started it all.

In the field they know no misfires: Iron Man and Captain America fit together in a perfect pattern, just like the whole Avengers assembly’s working out admirably. Suits and masks off, though, and the jabbing immediately begins.

Perhaps, if they _were_ friends, they would have simply stayed friends, bonded by chance or destiny and whatever-it-is-that’s-forged-in-battles, and everything would be much more sane and tolerable. But they never got to the friends part, skipping that step and ending up in the dynamics Tony has no idea how to deal with.

So. It starts out like an enmity and proceeds like a challenge, and then his thoughts are straying into entirely inappropriate directions they have no business travelling to, all of them concerning everybody’s favorite All-American Hero. Which has Tony alternating between planning devious strategies of seduction and bashing his head against various walls in hopes that this will be a quickly passing phase and an even quicker fading (albeit painful) memory.

Which makes Tony pull at their particular tug of war with doubled fervor. Because, the mature person that he is, covering up his attraction to Steve Rogers by belligerence and assault seems like the plan to resort to. That’s Tony Stark’s policy in life: when in doubt — be obnoxious. Unfortunately, he’s always been there for the fallout of this course of actions and he knows exactly how it usually works out. Yes, he is well and truly screwed.

 

 

**2.**

**draw** /drɔ:/  
**2.** produce an image by making lines and marks

 

Tony Stark is a brilliant man. The brightest, most talented mind of their time whose technological designs are transforming the world. He is also a child.

He’s attracted to dazzling and he is attracted to obvious, which makes him overlook the ordinary far too much. He’s not big on the human factor, doesn’t remember faces, birthdays, likes and dislikes and other mundane interests of people’s everyday lives. He prefers to exist in the shell of his workshop.

Outside of the blueprints and brainstorming and engineering brilliance his attention span to trivialities is rather lax. (And yes, he is still of a mind that the art opening/gala evening/memorial service or whatever he was supposed to attend which Pepper had reminded him of five times before departing, worried insanely about how she could leave him unattended for the whole of three days, was among such trivialities. And no need to blame it on Jarvis, either. Jarvis is not Pepper. Tony doesn’t task him with keeping track of his appointments — God forbid he might start lagging.)

Thus, him being as attentive as a toddler, it takes him quite a while to notice and to pay any kind of attention to Steve Rogers’s habit of sketching. Which he does, constantly, scribbling on the whites of the mission briefs Coulson draws up for them (earning his pained sighs, because Coulson cannot decide which he loves best — Captain America, or his precious reports); doodling on napkins in the dining hall (something Tony’s actually fond of himself, even though his own scribbles usually consist of numbers and geometric lines and _x_ ’s and _y_ ’s); even carrying a Moleskin sketchpad with him once in a blue moon, when the team spends long evenings in the Avengers Tower, amicably relaxing. For the longest time Tony is entirely oblivious to all of it happening. Once he notices, though, he just cannot give it a rest.

The thought of Captain America as an artist strikes him as the pinnacle of hilarious. His imagination instantly supplies him with a vivid image of Rogers in all his red-white-and-blue glory, mixing colors while using his shield as a palette and theatrically splashing oils over a canvas that gloriously depicts the Statue of Liberty or some such patriotic propaganda nonsense Cap would probably be drawing.

Strangely enough, when he conveys this mental image, no one else finds it particularly funny. Tony persists beating it into the ground until him and Steve are the only people left in the room, him finishing his beer, occasionally pacing and flicking through hundreds of channels mindlessly and Steve bearing his comments with uncharacteristic poise and continuing scribbling on a napkin, unconcerned.

“You forget,” he says patiently verging on patronizingly. “I wasn’t born into this uniform.” This tone always leaves Tony with a feeling Steve stops himself short of calling him _‘boy’_.

“No, I remember,” he retorts, instantly biting. “Just expected you to be more T.E. Lawrence, less Rembrandt.”

“I expected you to be more Edmond Dantès, and less Dorian Gray,” he covers the napkin in frustration and glares upwards at Tony who’s been lingering about, not quite peeking over his shoulder, because he’s not about to admit to any level of curiosity about this.

“More who and less who?” he echoes absently, taking a sip and settling back into his seat. “You need to brush up on your references.”

Steve doesn’t even give resigned sighs anymore, merely shaking his head and dropping his gaze down. He sits, slightly hunched, like he is out of place here, as opposed to Tony’s relaxed slackness that makes him virtually melt into the couch. He wonders why that is.

“Maybe I should commission you a portrait?” he muses aloud, half-jokingly. His mind’s eye immediately provides an image of a portrait from eighteen-hundreds, of some general atop of a white horse, cloak beating in the wind like a banner — only with himself as the main character, all posh and kitsch and blazing.

Steve seems to pick up on his inner egocentrism. “You mean like full on Bonaparte, oils, glossy fabric as a background, and you looking ten feet tall?”

“No, I mean black and white, A4, and in pen,” Tony sneers, leaning forward and tugging at the edge of his ink-assaulted napkin.

“Don’t disrespect the pen,” Steve quips back, holding it out of his reach.

They stare at each other with a subtle challenge, like they so often do, only lately it ceased to be an invitation for a fight and has been inviting something altogether new. What exactly, Tony has not yet deciphered. Steve’s face gets a pensive look about it before he abruptly gets up.

“Come with me,” he says, folding the napkin carefully and putting it away into his pocket for safekeeping. For a moment Tony stares at him with eyebrows shot up to the hairline, startled by the sudden change. Steve stares back and nods at him beguilingly. “I want to show you something in my room.”

These magic words push Tony out of the chair with a jolt of a little too much eagerness to be inconspicuous, as his mind provides him with a supplement of suggestive images that should not be thought in broad daylight in the presence of other people, namely Steve Rogers, but when the hell has he followed his own advice?

Thinking of Steve’s room naturally leads him to thinking of Steve’s **_bed_** and locking them inside and making a move, and he would love to come up with a grand plan that would in equal parts declare “bend me over” and “we will have an incredibly successful relationship if you just trust me”. Unfortunately, he’s only good with gestures conveying just the first part of that particular message.

(He wonders, fleetingly, if Steve maybe has a plan of his own.)

He is, frankly, surprised at himself, when five minutes later they are sitting at the said bed, and Tony’s hands are folded on his lap amenably, as Steve’s showing him his drawings — not napkin sketches, but actual full-blown works of art. And the man’s got talent — real to God talent.

For a moment Tony isn’t sure if the whole Vita-Ray thing didn’t botch up a sensitive artistic soul that could become a new Picasso. Then he remembers how Captain America is on the battlefield and decides that ‘sensitive’ is very relative with Steve, and everything’s a matter of perspective.

“Here,” Steve flips through one of his folders and shows Tony a drawing, exactly _‘black and white, A4, and in pen’_. It is of Natasha — and, let’s face it, who wouldn’t be inspired by **_her?_** — and black and white suits her.

“Ink and crowquill pen,” Steve clarifies.

It’s precise. Sharp. Clear-cut. No-nonsense, just like Natasha herself. No blurry lines, everything’s crisp and to the point. And yet the twist and curve of the lines seem to imply something further, deeper than the drawing can show…

“Has she seen it?” Tony looks up at Steve, prepared to urge him to show it off. Steve surprises him.

“Yes, of course. She _has_ one.”

“Oh?” Tony raises an eyebrow, handing the drawing back. “So, you’ve been presenting others with your talent and slighted me? I think I might take it personally.”

Steve shrugs. “I thought you’d laugh. Which you did,” he reminds him, but there’s warmth to the twist of his mouth. Voiced, the thought makes him hesitate before pulling out another drawing — like he’s not sure that Tony won’t start suddenly mocking him after all. He reassures him by plopping himself onto the bed and waiting patiently for Steve to get over his insecurities.

“This is your friend,” he says finally. “Virginia.”

Tony frowns and wants to tell him that he has never known **_anyone_** with such a ridiculously sumptuous name before he realizes he’s looking at Pepper (which, yes, sounds much more commonplace, of course it does, and _when exactly did he start calling her Pepper, was it even him who gave her the nickname it probably was…_ ) It seems to be pastel — delicate, light, almost translucent — and it is exactly Pepper in its radiant light joy and stark simple lines that remind you that she’s not just pretty and sunny, she’s smart and reliable and proper. This is all Pepper, and all of Pepper is here, in this drawing.

“When did you have time to even do it?”

Steve shrugs. “She comes by the Tower now and again. We spend time together.”

Tony can easily imagine it: them together, both so rational and kind and **_sweet_** it’s almost giving him diabetes to **_think_** about it, as acid possessiveness surges through him vigilantly. He will have to talk to Pepper about it, _pronto_.

“What else you got?” he handles the drawing back to him, his voice turned a bit snappish, earning him an odd glance from Steve, but the man doesn’t remark on it and just picks up the folder and settles onto the bed beside Tony, their elbows and knees _almost_ touching — almost, but not quite. And then he shows him…

There’s a whole gallery of portraits — all of the Avengers, and some S.H.I.E.L.D. agents — some he knows, but others he doesn’t (Steve explains that they were tutoring him after he ‘un-froze’). There are also his buddies from the War. And a woman. Yes, of course he’s heard about the woman — in fact, it was Coulson who told him with barely contained gush how they had promised each other a date right before Cap ran the Nazi plane into the Arctic and vanished, _woe is them_.

She’s drawn several times, in Da-Vinci-self-portrait red chalk that Steve calls _‘sanguine’_ on pages of ochre and mustard-yellow, which, Tony assumes, speaks tons about her character. She’s beautiful, yes. And tumultuous. Restless, the maroon color only adding more to her disquiet. Like a wave breaking against the rocks; a wild mare that wants to gallop forward, headstrong and refractory.

Somehow Tony has never pictured that to be the type of woman to attract Steve Rogers — he has assumed Pepper is more his type. Then he remembers that he’s pretty _refractory_ himself and decides to go along with this and be glad that she’s just a memory of the 40s, immortalized in the paper and chalk and **_yes_** , Steve’s memories. But nothing else. (And he’s aware exactly how freaking selfish and egotistical it makes him, but he’s entitled. He’s made ‘ego-centric’ into a bloody art.)

There are also landscapes. Places Steve knows from nowadays — Manhatten, and the view from the Avengers Tower, sketched in color and in carbon pencil. Others are places he doesn’t know. One of them is a beautiful watercolor and it has everything — the grass that’s the greenest and the sky that’s the clearest despite the automobiles having already begun polluting it. It’s light, but not pale; not losing color and also not losing clarity. _Purity_. Tony imagines he can even feel the air that taste of smoke, metal and **_freedom_**. There’s romance of a daydream to it, and despite not ever being there Tony doesn’t have to ask **_where_** that is. It’s Brooklyn. It’s home.

Steve says as much a few silent moments later. “I grew up there. Of course, it looks nothing like this now,” he laments with a sourness. Another thing taken away from him, remaining only in Steve’s mind. It makes Tony oddly guilty to have been celebrating it just a moment ago.

And then he sees the ‘classic studies’ — you know the ones, the pictures that every artist has: of plaster sculptures, or parts of them, made out to train the painter’s hand at live tissue, and anatomy of muscles and movements and postures. Steve doesn’t have school dummies. But Tony assumes he does have someone who can google it all for him if he hasn’t figured out the vital skill of using the computer all on his own by now. So there are all Renaissance sculptures. Done fleetingly in white chalk over blue paper.

There’s Michelangelo’s _David_ , of course, that is so trite that Tony immediately places it aside. The next one, however, makes him pause. It’s of a taut lean young man, in a winged helmet with wild untamed curls, holding a blade in his right hand and a head of a woman in his left. And unless Marie Antoinette was beheaded by a naked go-go boy, Tony’s memory of mythology is intact enough to recognize Perseus and the head of Medusa. What he does not remember from mythology or from his visit to Uffizi is Perseus being that generously **_hung_**. A different angle and Tony would almost swear that holding Medusa’s head was making the boy hard.

Tony’s gaze returns to David as inconspicuously as possible, dropping to his pelvis. And yes. There too. Tony barely suppresses a hysterical snort. Every visitor to Florence — even the one with a private jet like yours truly — knows that David’s _modest_ , to say the least, dimensions are a running joke among both tourists and Italians and are the stuff of irreverent postcards. Steve’s hand has corrected that mistake, making the seventeen feet tall guy as well-endowed as his height suggests he’s ought to be.

What exactly to make of that discovery Tony isn’t quite sure. He clears his throat, feeling flustered, and flips on to the next study. The third statue is unknown to him, but whoever the guy is there, he looks like a wanton slut. Everything about him — from the hat tipped to cover half of his face to long hair and coy eyelashes, sultry smirk and the swagger of the hip — speaks of playfulness that has little to do with the sword that the guy’s holding by its hilt, like a freaking disco stick.

His face hot, Tony shuts the folder abruptly and looks up at Steve. _It’s perfectly normal,_ he thinks. _I’m sure he has naked Venus stored in there somewhere as well_. But he can’t quite stop thinking about the muscled chests and erected penises and **_fuck_** Steve drew them and now he’s thinking of Steve, standing just as nakedly and just as lazily as Perseus, his dick semi-erect, and gripping Tony by his hair forcefully like Perseus was gripping Medusa (only his body is still intact, thank you very much), and he’s getting hard just by picturing it.

If Steve is in any way aware of what’s going on in Tony’s mind, he says nothing. On the contrary, he appears quite calm and unsuspecting — and Tony’s pretty sure he wouldn’t be unembarrassed about his cock-obsessive Renaissance studies. He rises to his feet, the decision steeling itself in his mind with a steadfast, _That is it!_ He is going to get Steve alone, and he is going to give him the best fucking **_lay_** of his life.

The plan he’s been aching to realize for some time now is finally all formed in his head like a blueprint of one of his projects. Tony declares, “I want you to draw me.” The fact that they are alone in Steve’s room helps voice it immensely.

“I have drawn you,” Steve points out, flipping through the folder, and the ‘blueprint’ shrivels in Tony’s head in defeat. “I’ve drawn you plenty.” Then he is pulling out a page with swift and sleek swooshes of red, yellow and brown, a whole page of them, and Tony perks up, relieved. Those are drawings of Iron Man.

“In my suit,” he makes a gesture in the air, indicating just that. “My helmet. And you’re damn good with faces,” he motions to the folder in a crude attempt at an off-hand compliment. He wants it to be sincere but he has never actually praised anyone, and the laud he receives in his own address is just pretentious public flattery, not an inch of genuineness to it. Thus he finds himself in an uncharted territory and rounds back to the original statement. “I want to see how you’d draw mine.”

Steve smiles at him, amused. “So. You’re _commissioning **me**_ a portrait?”

Tony raises his eyebrow challengingly. “Why, you’re not up to it? I assure you, I can afford whatever you’re billing. And if you’re not, you should.” He crosses his arms, looking at Cap expectantly.

“You’re serious,” Steve stands up to put away his folder and looks down at him dubiously.

“You know, I do have taste. Ask any art gallery — they all want me at their events and openings and such.”

Steve leans back at his table and considers it. “Where?”

Tony doesn’t allow the triumphant grin to spread too wide — it may look menacing, wouldn’t want to scare him off. “Wherever you want,” he shrugs easily. “Here. Now.” Yes. Preferably.

Steve snorts. “It’s not a five-minutes task, you do realize that, right?” His voice is low again, the tremor making the hair on Tony’s arms stand on end.

“You decide,” is the only response he’s able to formulate. “You have the artistic eye. You’ll decide best.”

Steve nods, considering, and then says, watching Tony’s face keenly, “Your studio.”

Blam. Instantly, they are in the middle of an ardent staring contest. The studio is his adytum, the innermost sanctuary where he is the uncrowned king. Pepper’s the only one to have been ever allowed there. Rhodey’s been there by pure chance (and thank God for that we’re not touching that memory with a ten-foot pole). Steve knows that. And he must have guessed that Tony’s pushing for something here. So, just like it always is between them, he pushes back.

Tony’s lips form into an _‘I-know-whatcha-doing-here’_ grin, and he caves. “Fine,” he says, a little defiantly, and there’s a glimmer of slight surprise in Steve’s eyes before the eye contact is broken as he nods and Tony turns away with satisfaction.

“Tomorrow?” he proposes.

“Sure,” Tony agrees. “I make my own schedule.”

“Well, I don’t,” Steve reminds him. “Some of us take our work here seriously. I’ll come by in the evening?”

“I’ll make myself available,” Tony smirks and nods before exiting the room. Evening sounds perfect.

 

 

**3.**

**draw** /drɔ:/  
**3.** be the cause of a specific response:  
• direct someone’s attention to something;  
• reach a conclusion by deduction or inference from a set of circumstances;  
• _**attract.**_

 

He chooses to wear his favorite suit.

“Are you sure that’s what you want, sir?” Jarvis’s voice seems dubious.

“Of course, it’s my favorite!” Tony insists.

“Indeed, sir. Which is why you _never_ wear it. You like it too much,” the AI points out with dry amusement.

Tony pauses, contemplating what exactly it means that he wants to christen the suit by tonight’s events, but most of his explanations tend to incline towards a spectrum of feelings too delicate for him to linger on. Becoming inexplicably unnerved, he promptly abandons the line of thought altogether, merely insisting that the suit is indeed the one he wants.

Jarvis informs him as soon as Steve arrives and lets their guest in, guiding him to the workshop where the master of the mansion awaits.

“Welcome,” Tony says, throwing his arms wide theatrically, as if claiming the whole room as his kingdom.

“Hello,” Steve smiles, slightly hesitant, as he looks around.

“Well? What do you think?” Tony keeps his arms spread, meaning for the other man to take him in.

Steve’s gaze remains calm, verging on disinterested. “Err, it’s good?” he drawls questioningly, and Tony deflates somewhat. There goes his favorite suit.

“It suits you,” Steve smiles politely.

Tony chooses to remember that Steve’s sense of taste and style has to be very different — the fashion has skipped seventy years in the man, after all, as has everything else.

“So?” Tony finally drops his arms, and arches his eyebrow suggestively. “Where do you want me?”

The particular phrasing doesn’t go unnoticed, and Steve looks at him, startled. He isn’t baited easily, though, and with a quiver of lips he parries, “I will not draw you like this.”

Tony sighs, impatient and a little exasperated as the suit goes further and further underappreciated. “What then, you want me to don my armor? I thought we agreed against it.” He shuffles his expensive shoes against the sleek floor lazily, wondering what Steve has in mind.

“I came to draw Tony Stark, not the Iron Man.” Steve studies him with a flustering intent. “I want to draw **_you_** ,” he declares, stressing the pronoun. “Not your fancy clothes and impeccable style. Not the… genius-billionaire-playboy-philanthropist,” he mimics Tony’s voice quite well, making him grimace with a grain of regret at having uttered those words.

“This,” Steve reaches forward and brushes the fabric of the suit with the tips of his fingers, “is beautiful.” He raises his eyes to meet Tony’s. “It is also another artist’s work. It’s a representation, finished and impermeable — of your taste, your wealth, your _façade_ you’re conscious of.” His hand comes to be pressed against Tony’s chest before he draws it away and takes a step back (much to Tony’s immediate chagrin _no stay please your hand is very welcome_ ).

“Drawing you like this would be like drawing you in a golden crown with an ermine mantle on your shoulders.”

Tony smirks. “Can’t say I’m opposed to that idea.”

“Can’t say it’s good for your overblown ego,” Steve echoes, mirroring his smirk with mirth.

His next words, however, stun Tony into utter silence.

“Disrobe.”

He tries computing it, but his hard drive kinda short-circuits.

Dis•robe, his inner Jarvis provides meticulously. From _‘dis-’_ , expressing reversal, and _‘robe’_ , perhaps on the pattern of French _‘desrober’_. Meaning: _to take off one’s clothes, to undress_. Which cannot possibly be what prim and stout Captain Morality would ask him. Only he just has.

Tony watches Steve’s retreating back as he walks off to the opposite end of the room nonchalantly, and clears his throat. “Run that by me again, would you?” he says.

“You’ll have to take your clothes off,” Steve repeats, looking at him over his shoulder. “All of them,” he adds with precision that leaves literally _no room_ for any misinterpretation.

Tony is still scrambling for alternative context. “Pardon?”

“I want to draw **_you_** ,” Steve repeats, as if that falls under the category of any kind of coherent explanations. “Oh come, I _was_ an art student,” he says, noticing Tony’s expression, or maybe a lack thereof. “I have drawn people _au naturel_ before. It’s the greatest kind of artistry there is, a perfect character study. It’s clean and obvious, and nothing gets overlooked.”

“I thought that a portrait was sufficient enough for that,” Tony manages unsteadily.

“I want to draw you,” he repeats simply (and Tony finds he has come to loathe this phrase in under two minutes). Steve narrows his eyes with amusement. “Are you embarrassed?”

“What? Nah. Me? Pfft. Why would I be?” Tony snorts, unbuttoning his jacket and shrugging it off. He thinks about tossing it away dramatically, but it _is_ his favorite, so he folds it and carries to the table. Despite his words he _does_ find himself somewhat disconcerted, even as he’s got no good explanation as to why.

Steve doesn’t seem to notice his apprehension, looking around the workshop for the place to set up their drawing session. “Pull up that chair,” he instructs, pointing to a small stool in the corner.  
Tony obliges.

It’s all a novelty. One would think Steve Rogers is at his strongest and most imposing when he’s wearing the Cap, leading the Avengers into battle. This, here, the lab is Tony’s domain. Yet with just a folder of paper and a toolkit of an artist Steve still manages to emanate startling confidence. He’s _taking over_ the workshop. And Tony isn’t sure which surprises him more: that Steve can, or that he’s letting him.

“Here,” Steve points where to put the chair. “I like the light.”

He turns away to find himself a seat as well, and Tony just stands there, by the stool that seems too narrow and too low to be a good spot for him to perch upon, but for once he doesn’t argue. He hesitates to ask if he should start undressing. In the end, he decides to take a little initiative, pulls at the hem of the T-shirt he was wearing underneath the two-piece Boss (because hello, did you really expect him to be sporting a white shirt too in his own house?) and tugs it over his head.

Steve pulls up a chair and freezes as he turns around. Tony is inwardly smug at finally pushing him out of his casual unconcern. “What are you doing? Stop!” he says, a little too quickly.

“What? You backing out on me?” Tony places his hands on his hips suggestively.

“I need to show you the posture first,” Steve’s almost frowning he’s so serious. “Unless you want to squirm your bare ass all over the metal, I suggest that you hold off losing the pants.”

Tony crosses his arms, his expression shifting into a demanding _Well, talk then!_

“Sit.” Steve retorts, reading his pertinent gaze loud and clear. The iron command in his voice doesn’t disappoint.

Tony drops onto the stool, arms still crossed.

“Don’t be defensive,” Steve observes.

“Am not!” ( _ridiculous!_ ) Tony retorts, crossing his arms tighter.

Steve just smiles placatingly, as if he knows better, even when there is _nothing_ to know. “Relax. Sit straight.” Tony does, straightening his shoulders and placing his palms on his knees, assuming what he thinks of as a ‘pupil’ posture. If he were at a desk, he’d fold his hands like a good boy he… well, never have been, and that was the end of that particular metaphor.

“Turn a little to the right,” Steve instructs, studying him so attentively it actually makes Tony feel self-conscious. He’s used to people staring at him with adoration, veneration, admiration — even Captain America himself, when occasionally he falls in line during a mission and does something exactly right (before he opens his mouth, of course, and his ego falls out). But right now Steve’s studying him with the unflattering precision of a doctor, like he can see all his faults, outer (which, let’s face it, are nonexistent) and inner (which are quite a few).

“Spread your legs wider,” he says next. Tony shoots him a sultry look to cover up the awkwardness of the request, but Steve doesn’t take notice.

“Relax,” the bastard repeats instead, all business, managing to see right through him yet again.

“Put your hand on the chair between your thighs,” he steers him further. Tony’s a little relieved to do that — mostly because it means he’ll still be covered up while Steve will be drawing him: all of a sudden the idea of flashing his junk in circumstances that do not include sexual congress isn’t as deliciously domineering as it was ten minutes ago.

“The other one,” Steve corrects him, jerking his chin impatiently. Tony swaps the right arm for the left. “Now grip the edge of the chair. Ball up your right hand into the fist and draw it behind your back. Place it on the stool. Lean your weight on it, on the knuckles.”

“You know, it’s not exactly comfortable,” Tony complains, carrying out the motions.

“Pull closer to the edge,” Steve advises. “Now, turn your torso a little more to the right, so that your left shoulder is facing me directly.

 _And how the hell can he just move me around like furniture, when I’m breathtakingly shirtless like this?_ Tony muses with sour aggravation, twisting on the stool.

“Your left hand,” Steve continues, oblivious, “adjust it like you’re pulling the edge of the stool upward, onto yourself. Huddle your left shoulder a little, so it would hide your—” he stutters, finally uncomfortable, and flickers his eyes to look into Tony’s before steadily saying, “ _nipple._ ”

Tony snorts, pleased. So it’s not all a bloody medical exam to him after all.

“Now,” Steve clears his throat, regaining his composure, “lift your chin up. This coy tilt doesn’t seem to be _‘you’_ ,” he says to off-set his previous fumble.

Tony snorts and jerks his chin up.

“Not that high,” Steve gives him half a smirk.

Tony smiles wryly, lowering his head.

“That’s it,” Steve nods, looking him over. “Now, memorize the pose,” he instructs and falls silent, expectant. Tony looks himself over, tensing the muscles to remember the exact position. Then he stands up intrepidly and unzips his pants.

He imagines that Steve takes a little intake of breath sharply, but when he raises his head to check, his eyes are glued to Tony’s face, expression perfectly composed.

Tony still grins smugly, then pushes his fly _slowly_ down and slides the pants off in one smooth motion, sits back onto the chair and kicks the shoes off, before shedding the pants completely.

He’s wearing no underwear underneath, and, with a challenging-slash-suggestive raise of a chin, he adopts the position they’ve chosen, spreading his knees and feeling like a damn _Hustler_ model.

“The—” Steve pauses and coughs into his fist, motioning for him to huddle his shoulder.

“The _nipple_?” Tony teases, enjoying the fact that a simple world is making Cap blush like an unseasoned debutant.

Steve just nods and clears his throat, not trusting his voice apparently. The look on his face is worth it, though — like there’s a ragged sigh stealing from his lips, and he is straining to make no sound nor movement.

Tony catches a sound in his own throat that, he is sire, would be profanely guttural if allowed to escape. Instead, they are both silent, their eyes glued to each other. For a moment Tony can think of nothing but how unbelievably _soothingly_ blue Steve’s are. For a moment he thinks the whole ‘draw me’ endeavor is going to be forgotten and they will just get down to it.

But Steve seems to be waiting for something, looking perplexed, as if missing parts of the story leading up to a good punch line. Tony feels blood rush to his face again in this annoying alarm that he’s not giving Steve what he’s expecting. That he’s somehow wanting.

“Look to the right,” Steve demands, breaking the silence. Tony does and sees from the corner of his eye that Steve picks up one pencil. Then sets it down, chooses another. “Now look at me.” His voice is an enticingly forceful command.

For a moment their eyes lock again, and Steve’s gaze is like a lightning that passes through Tony, almost making him shudder, making him _shift_ , but he cannot. Because Steve drops his gaze and Tony hears the faint scratching of the pencil against the paper.

He is being recreated.

 

 

***

 

In a matter of ten or so minutes he is getting hot all over, and the urge to move, to wipe his forehead is getting unbearable. Thinking of how much time this is going to take physically hurts Tony. Issue number one: he has not accounted for this to take so bloody long. Issue number two: the level of temperature in the room is so not the problem. It is perfectly cool and level and sometimes Tony feels the prickle of air conditioning that Jarvis keeps in check. Everything is in perfect order. The problem is — he did not expect that having Steve stare him down with this unravelling scrutiny would affect him quite so much.

It makes him wish they were seated in another room: upstairs, with a window — then he would be able to look outside, watch the flow of the traffic, watch the ant colony of New-Yorkers like a demiurge, observe the world change — because nowadays changes are fast. Example: Yesterday he was not aware of Steve’s gallery of little masterpieces. Tonight he’s posing in one.

He is glad now that this will be just a black-and-white portrait — a full-blown Van Gogh he imagined at first would have taken weeks, months to complete. This — this takes no longer than a photo shoot for a cover of Times would. The difference is that while choosing only one picture for a cover, the Times photographers snap a buttload of them, and Tony is stuck with all five hundred of scrap variants that he never looks at. **_This_** will yield just one result. But it will be worth a lifetime of photo sessions — even if he could go back in time and make Andy Warhol do all of them.

“Try to relax,” Steve says out of nowhere. “I know you want to let your eyes wander, find something to watch, but it mirrors in your face.”

 _Thinking I’m a demiurge mirrors in my face?_ Tony muses inwardly. _Well, actually, it might._

“Don’t think so much,” Steve asks.

“I can’t help it,” Tony frowns before remembering to school his expression. “I can’t just put my mind into hibernate.”

Belatedly, he catches himself, because Steve might not be acquainted with the modern tech enough to understand the quip and _how old is this word anyway?_ , but the man offers him a thin smile. “Just try to relax,” he repeats softly.

And Tony does his best to adhere.

The irritating thing is that it’s Steve himself who isn’t making this easy. Tony’s thinking of him. Of himself sitting before him. It’s like sitting in front of a fireplace that is blazing hotly — but it’s not the bodily warmth he feels, it’s the heat of blood rushing inside of him.

Tony tries to force himself to think of nothing. His mind is wandering over trifles — the pizza he meant to order, the joke Happy told him the day before, the new cufflinks Pepper bought him. But his mind refuses to laze about idle whatnots for too long. He starts thinking of his projects, of his science and of science in general, which makes him want to close his eyes, or to frown, and Steve reminds him to relax again…

He lets his eyes wander, but he knows every little nook of his workshop and looking at the familiar things makes him restless. He doesn’t know every nook of Steve. So, ultimately, he just thinks of him. And how Steve is drawing him.

Which, as far as his lapses in judgment go, is his greatest undoing: because, man, this is Steve Rogers, and don’t you know what has been said about the man throughout the years? He was — _is_ — the pinnacle of human physical perfection. Looking at him now, having nothing else to occupy him at all, like he’s a gawking tourist in a freaking Captain America museum, Tony knows with a sinking feeling just how true that is.

Steve is unlike any man he has ever known — and, them both being a part of the Avengers, that is saying something. Which is why Tony knows just how desperate his attraction is. Because while Steve is the crowning masterpiece of humanity, in his most self-deprecating moments Tony is perfectly aware that on the spectrum of good vs. bad he is pretty much on the end opposite of Steve. And, with his penchant at choosing self-destructive hobbies, falling in love with Steve Rogers really isn’t that surprising. It is that Steve might reciprocate that raises in him hopes and fears and doubts.

The longer Tony spends stealing glances at him, the easier it becomes to endure the process because it becomes apparent — Steve is not seeing him. It’s as if he’s looking at somebody else, _something_ else; as if he’s already seeing the finished piece. He’s not looking at his chest, but at the light falling on his skin. He’s not looking at his thighs but studying the anatomy of his tense muscles. It’s almost as if Tony himself is not here.

At least that’s what Tony pretends it’s like. As far as self-delusions go this is his most innocent one, and it does make him feel oddly better. Makes it easier to distance himself from ogling Steve, too: as he is staring, so does Tony stare, and as Steve is not seeing him, Tony doesn’t see Steve. It’s like they are separated by a glass and he watches him draw like he would watch strangers pass him by on the street.

Steve’s face is serious, focused, a frown of concentration on his forehead, making Tony somewhat uneasy — he has never found himself at the receiving end of such a level of intensity before. Steve’s eyes do not meet Tony’s gaze, making it somewhat easier, yet also this much harder because he knows that this complete exclusive attention is trained onto his chest, or the curve of his abdomen, or the muscles of his thighs. He tries not to think about his left arm and what part of his anatomy it’s covering, because it leads to questioning what **_Steve_** , in his turn, is thinking while drawing him. Which makes him itch with heat all over.

(He tries to think or not think of many things, but that hasn’t particularly worked out now, has it?) Thinking about it is excrutiating, but not thinking proves impossible. It is the pencil, or maybe Steve’s eyes, the way he’s blowing onto his hair when he lowers his head too much, the way his mouth moves when he exhales or licks his lips, the way his elbow moves — all of it combined. But the lips become inviting, and the gaze erotic, and the pencil scratching the paper becomes a _hand_ — a hand that Tony can almost feel caressing his naked skin. And damn if it isn’t making him half-hard just to think about this.

And, actually, it is…

His blood manages to rush to his face, making his cheeks and forehead burn and prickle, while still supplying his traitorous dick with enough firepower to rise at half-mast. His left hand is gripping into the chair so desperately he thinks he might just break it. His shoulders are rising and falling in futile attempts at quick shallow breathing that would calm him down. It doesn’t calm him down — in fact, if it’s possible, it calms him right _up_.

He scans his brain for best mind-bleaching images that would help in this uneasy situation, and comes up exactly with _squat_. All it does is makes him inwardly fidget, trying to locate a sufficiently repulsing memory that would revert the problem to its modest default. His eyes run around the room, trying to latch on to something, as his brain processes inopportunely freeze, but his workshop is full of his creations that are one step short from arousing him, and then there’s Steve who simply _does_.

His eyes fall on the man in question desperately, and his dick gives an eager twitch. Tony tries not to twinge in mortification and shuts his eyes in defeat.

“Tony,” Steve’s voice is tense and disapproving.

“Hm. What?” ( _please god don’t let him notice—_ )

“Keep your eyes open.” (And Steve doesn’t.)

“Yessorry,” becomes a single word in his mouth as he clears his throat, inhales sharply, and braces himself for the painful remainder of the process. He prays Steve is closing to a finish.

The concern becomes futile in several minutes, when the lucky break runs out. Steve’s hand pauses, and Tony knows with dismay — he’s _noticed_. His eyes flicker, hesitant to meet Tony’s, and a faint blush slowly spreads all over his face. He licks his lips, then finally looks up.

He’s nervous, perhaps for the first time since they’ve met — **_really_** nervous. Which makes Tony a little more unafraid, because fear makes Steve seem a little less perfect. He says nothing, looking into his eyes, and Tony isn’t sure what exactly to say either.

He clears his throat nervously. “Happens to nude models all the time, I’m sure,” he mutters through barely unclenched teeth, afraid to move his jaw, yet trying to laugh it up anyway.

Steve doesn’t respond — just holds his gaze in place. For a moment there is a ripple of heat between them: this moment, where the flirtatious joke, the issue they’ve been dancing around is finally acknowledged. Tony wants Steve and knows Steve knows it. And, from that flaring look that makes his heart pound against his ribcage painfully, it does appear that the desire is mutual.

Then Steve casts his eyes down again, and Tony is sure he must have imagined it. It’s Steve Rogers they’re talking about, after all.

“I told you to relax,” he says after some minutes of glancing up and down, his tone almost reproachful.

“I am perfectly relaxed,” Tony assures him through gritted teeth.

“Your tension is pretty visible,” Steve snorts. “In fact, it blocks my view of your abdomen.”

Tony smirks, faintly relieved. _Ha! Innuendo jokes!_ He can get behind that.

“You’re right,” he inclines his head slightly, trying not to shift his posture too much. “There is a **_lot_** of tension.” He wiggles his eyebrows, as if saying, _Impressed yet?_

Steve chuckles, rolling his eyes briefly. Then stares up at him keenly once more. Perhaps he is looking for the new line to draw, but for Tony this development has shattered the imaginary glass between them, made him back into a man instead of an artist, whose searching focused glances are once again harrowing to endure.

Nothing else is said between them for a long time. Tony sits in dutiful silence, all hot and bothered, and Steve is feigning ignorance, proceeding with the task.

By the end of the second hour Steve appears to be almost at an end. He leans back and stares at Tony again, watching him without movement, just raising his hand to change a stroke or two once every few minutes. This proves to be the most exhausting part of all.

He has thought that he got a handle on this modeling thing, figured out what it is Steve wants from him, but now he thinks he was wrong. Steve just sits and seems to be waiting for Tony to do something. Perhaps to go _limp_ , finally? He isn’t sure if his erection is that visible but it has got to be a point of embarrassment to sustain it for a little less than an hour — one freaking **_hour_**! Isn’t he supposed to deflate, or something, as the blood drains away? Only it doesn’t. He’s either superhuman (which, admittedly, he almost is) or on the verge of fucking priapism.

Or he’s really — **_very_** — horny

Just when he’s about to open his mouth and say something (because he cannot bear the intense silence any longer), Steve abruptly stands up. He shakes the paper, letting the crumbles of graphite fall onto the floor, and walks to the table where he has laid out his folder, placing the paper on top of it. And he stays there, leaning forward onto his arms and unmoving, hard at contemplating something.

“You done?” Tony inquires carefully, unsure as to how to act about all the unsaid things that are still hanging in the air between them. “Can I get up?” he makes an attempt to do just that.

“No,” Steve shoots him a hard warning gaze over his shoulder, steely and forward. “Sit right there,” he says assertively and turns away again.

Tony’s eyes widen slightly and he shifts, watching Steve hover over the drawing. _What else is there?_ he wonders.

Steve turns back to him and for the first time this evening he appears extremely diffident and just as tense as Tony is — in the _‘rigid and anxious’_ sense of the word, not the _‘excited and eager’_ of his lower body.

And there’s this look again — this fervid exploring gaze that seems a little insatiate. But this time nothing warrants this look — Steve isn’t drawing him anymore. And Tony suddenly is very self-conscious and distrustful under the undivided attention of this stare.

Steve comes closer, and Tony realizes that his eyes are fixed on the most uncomfortable, _‘not-made-for-gawking’_ part of his anatomy. And that is not his dick — there is a little exhibitionist hiding deep inside him, after all.

It’s his arc reactor.

Four people have seen it since it became a part of him. Yinsen, the very doctor who installed it — and died to protect him. Pepper who is the only person he trusts enough without a second thought, who is family. Rhodey, who had been aware of the palladium poisoning long before Tony had the heart to tell Pepper. And Obadiah ‘Hope-He-Rots-In-Hell’ Stane.

Now Steve joins that small number. And Tony has never felt so exposed.

“Okay, fun part’s over,” he clears his throat, crossing his legs while still using his left hand to cover up his jewels. With his right one he reaches to rub his left shoulder, trying at subtle, but actually letting his forearm cover his chest. “Let me get dressed.”

Steve flickers his eyes up to meet his gaze, and takes another step forward, careful, unsure — he seems his impeccable self, but the look in his eyes is uneasy, like he hasn’t done anything quite like this before. Which doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in Tony, because this is the guy who has walked into Nazi bases — actual **_Nazi_** bases; who has gone through war and who has literally died for his country. (Mind you, Tony almost did too, but he wasn’t really thinking about it at that time. Back in that moment, he wasn’t doing much thinking at all.) Steve is the thinking type. Tony is sure he had thought long and hard before crashing that plane in the Arctic. And he has thought hard about whatever it is he’s about to do.

Somehow, Steve ends up standing right in front of Tony, less than two feet away. Raising his hand, he touches Tony’s arm that covers his reactor, and the contact sends a jolt through both of them sharply.

Tony feels his Adam’s apple moving strainedly. For the first time in forever he cannot understand the situation he’s in, cannot fully grasp what is going on, cannot plot all courses. Steve, on the other hand, taut and nervous that he is, still seems to stand firmly on his feet.

He leads Tony’s hand back down, ordering it to stay there with his forceful fingers. His palm rises to rest on Tony’s chest, on the left, over his heart, not invading the area around the device that keeps him running — Steve’s sensible that way. Only he’s not, because the next move he makes is even more insane than putting his fingers anywhere **_near_** as private as the arc reactor.

Steve drops to his knees.

The movement steals the breath from Tony’s lungs, leaves him absolutely immobilized and in the state between shock and anticipation, the coldness coiling and uncoiling in the pit of his stomach. His cock moves to stand higher as more blood pumps into it from Tony’s brain (has got to explain his utter incapability to form a sound), and **_yes_** , dammit, he’s afraid! Steve’s looking up at him with fondness and thrill and the mirroring trepidation, as if wanting to ask, _Do I have your permission?_ but he just takes Tony’s silence for consent. So he opens his mouth and inhales him whole.

It. is. insane.

The whole situation is totally off its rockers.

For all that he has imagined this happening in a thousand different way, thousand different places—

_Steve as naked as Tony is right now. Steve spreading wide onto Tony’s king-size bed. The way his fingers would curl into the bedsheets. The way he’d pant. The way he’d moan. The way he’d scream…_

— never in his wildest fantasies has he imagined anything like this.

_The way he’d kiss. The way he’d bite. The way he’d bend. The way he’d **feel** …_

Yet somehow here they are, and there has been no kissing involved at all — something he has not expected from Captain Perfect Romance. Instead, Steve has just taken him into his mouth.

His sensibility must be enough to realize that after enduring a hard-on for an hour Tony was just not in the mood for idle CPR sort of exploration. Mouth-to-mouth can wait — **_this_** , this is what he’s wanted, the tight hot sensation of a mouth enclosing his cock, tongue laving over his shaft.

Gripping his fingers tight into the edges of the stool, Tony moans.

Steve’s tongue traces a circle around the head before covering it, lips surrounding him gingerly, and Tony reminds himself that Steve has **_never_** done anything like this. Fingers fly up to rest upon Tony’s thighs and then, before he has a chance to crave more contact, they wrap around his shaft, almost protectively at first, then tighter. The lips move down the column to his balls.

Tony jerks again and nearly slides off the chair. “Steve,” he murmurs, reaching his hand timidly to caress and sink his fingers into the blonde hair. They are even softer than he imagined they would be — then again, Steve is the one person who still manages to remain all things childhood and sunny and innocent, despite being a soldier that has seen war and horror an Tony’s not thinking about that, not of _that_ , not _now_. No, he’s brushing the hair from the intent face, and Steve smiles briefly around his mouthful but doesn’t stop the burningly achingly slow movement of his tongue.

Tony watches him. It’s endlessly fascinating, and it seems he has never seen Steve concentrate **_this_** much — not on the battlefield, not even just now, when he was drawing him. A tongue follows along the vein on the underside of his cock, sucks at the skin and releases it with a warm exhalation, while Tony watches the play of every inner thought and feeling on Steve’s face and it’s the **_watching_** that fills him with even more exhilaration.

Steve’s mouth returns to the top, a glint of a smirk in the blue eyes, before he swallows his head, sucks into his mouth, lapping at it with almost no pressure. Tony feels himself shaking, tearing at the seams and losing it. Steve pulls back to place a lick along the full length of the shaft, circling it with his tongue, then takes him deeper, moving faster, and squeezes him, just so, just like that, yes, just there, just—just—yes— _yes!_ — and it’s too soon, but he’s been waiting for it for a fucking hour, and he’s coming, as hard as he has never done in his life. He should have probably given some warning, but his mind is blessedly empty, without any ability to form words, and he just had to, he _had_ to—

Steve doesn’t appear to mind, though, not releasing him from the heated cavern of his mouth and drinking him obligingly until the pulsing ebbs. Tony hears his own breath, ragged and nearly hoarse, as if he has been shouting **_all_** this time.

Steve lifts his mouth off Tony’s cock, his smile appearing both content and demure, because now they have to say something, acknowledge something about this insane moment. Something flickers briefly in his face, making him look almost contrite — because, Tony knows, one impertinent remark from him, and Steve will be regretting the endeavor immediately.

That turns out to be not what he’s worried about. “That… wasn’t taking advantage, was it?” he asks in a low voice.

“No,” Tony replies urgently, his voice uncomfortably high and hoarse. “I believe, the laws of sexual innuendo call this ‘lending a hand’. Or, you know, mouth.” He clears his throat and runs a hand through his damp hair. God, when has it become so hot here?

Steve shifts uncomfortably, and Tony understands he feels the need to talk about this, and he closes his eyes, sagging back, because _please let it not be right now_ , not after his most earth-shattering orgasm. Immediately he snaps his eyes wide open again, realizing that so far this has been a one-way street, and Steve has got to be painfully throbbingly subjugatingly hard in those pants.

“Oh,” he says, both epiphanic and admonishing. “Oh, you are wearing too much clothes for this to go on as it should,” he declares, fingers hooking at the buttons of Steve’s shirt as he brings them both to their feet, stripping Steve with fantastic speed. He wants, _needs_ to see him naked, all smooth golden skin and perfection, but as soon as he glimpses through the opening shirt after a few buttons, he cannot wait. His fingers continue working, but he brings his mouth down on Steve’s chest greedily, licking and kissing and marking and _yes, the nipples_ , he thinks deviously, capturing one with his tongue, and Steve’s head falls back and he is sighing and panting and begging with his labored breathing alone.

The shirt comes flying onto the floor, and Tony’s hands roam over Steve’s chest, Steve’s back, Steve’s shoulders, and he wants him all to himself and cannot get enough of him. Steve, in turn, doesn’t know what to do with his hands and grapples at Tony’s arms like his life depends on it.

“I want you so badly,” he mumbles into Steve’s neck, feeling the racing of his pulse under his tongue. Now that the shirt is out of the way, he slides his palm onto Steve’s dick that is straining against his pants. It finally elicits a moan, as he seems to let go off his control — but before Tony has the chance to unzip his fly, Steve stops him.

“Wait,” he manages to breathe out, and Tony halts, looking up at him expectantly. He isn’t eager to interrupt this and Steve must sense his annoyance. “Sorry. I just — I need to say something.”

Tony narrows his eyes with mild suspicions. Knowing Cap, he is about to profess his undying love and pop out a ring, or something, proposing marriage and adopting a blind African baby. “How relevant is this?” he asks with reservation. He’s all for it, naturally, but can they file for adoption _after_ Tony gets Steve off?

“Very,” Steve looks at him deadly serious.

Tony sighs, preparing to suffer through this, but if it’s not, in fact, relevant, he is dropping Steve off at his shower with a porn magazine, for him to ponder how to handle mood-killing remarks.

(He does not allow himself to even linger on the opposite possibility that Steve is about to tell him that they, after all, shouldn’t, and it’s not good for the team, and Tony isn’t good enough for him anyway, not that Steve would ever phrase it that way, the kind bastard that he is. Such remark, as much as Tony doesn’t like to admit it, would crush something inside of him, and he has never liked to demoralize himself by preparing for the worst.)

“Shoot,” he allows liberally, bracing himself.

“I’ve never done this before,” Steve huffs out.

Tony stares at him. Steve stares back.

Aaand, wait, what? That was it?

Tony rolls his eyes, pressing his hand back onto Steve’s crotch. “Well great, Captain _Obvious_ , neither have I,” he informs him.

Steve groans in exasperation and actually looks like he might blush. “I don’t mean I’ve never been with a guy,” he grits through tightly clenched teeth, emanating such scorching embarrassment like he’s about to melt and percolate through the floor. “I mean I have never **_ever_** done this.” He gestures in between them, taking care to include both their lips and their groins in the wave of his hand.

And Tony gets it. Steve’s a virgin.

The thought is so sudden and ridiculous that it makes his mouth twist into a grin, and Steve shoots him a dangerous ‘don’t-you- ** _dare_** -crack-a-joke-about-this’ look. Tony purses his lips obediently, stifling a chuckle, and then he actually thinks about it and he looks Steve all over. “Wh—Ne-ver? Like, **_‘never’_** never? Like celibacy abstaining **_‘never’_**?”

Steve’s glare is murderously. “That is so not funny,” he mutters.

“Well, it’s a little funny,” Tony tries to combine insulting grinning with apologetic shrugging. He doesn’t believe it goes very well. “I mean, come on!” he exclaims. “Never?! _Really_?”

Steve pushes him away. “Think about it,” he says forcefully, like he wants to smack him. “Before becoming this,” he points at all of himself, “I was a little busy trying to lie my way into the army and being beaten in the back alleys.”

“But after,” Tony is still struggling between mockery and disbelief. “I mean, come on, with this packaging,” he stares at Steve’s bare chest pointedly, “girls had to be swooning _all over you_. So…” he raises his eyebrows suggestively, as if saying _Spill!_ “You never? A little behind-the-scenes action on your tour?” Tony remembers old videos of Cap and the girls in uniforms that sung for him, the ones he was lifting up on the motorcycles. They were **_babes_** …

Steve sighs tiredly, quickly fed up with Tony’s flippancy. “I could probably say something about strength of character, but I believe that the appropriate colloquialism is, _Have you met me?_ ” his smile is both patronizing and sad.

And Tony feels bad for him. Not the shallow ‘sorry-you’ve-missed-out-on-this-fantastic-past-time’ kind of bad, but actually shamefully bad, because Steve has been expecting some understanding and restraint from him, and Tony knows he’s not easy to be around — he’s around himself 24/7.

“Good point,” he says, his glibness muted. “Well, okay, then. It doesn’t change anything right?” he shrugs. “You have no idea what to do. I have a vague idea of what has been done to me, which is only half-ass applicable here. Nothing’s changed. Right?” He looks at Steve expectantly.

Steve’s answering expression appears almost disappointed, before he smiles his kind and unselfish smile that only he can muster up at his age and be honest about it, and nods acceptingly, “Yeah. Sure. Nothing’s changed.”

Tony gets a distinct feeling of an expectation let down. _Come on, Tony, use your much-lauded brains,_ a little Pepper on his shoulder scolds. _He expects you to be the responsible adult!_

Only he’s a big child and he doesn’t do adult.

He is suddenly reminded of how he begged his father for a dog when he was a boy, and his father told him that if he gets one, it will not just be his to play with — it will be his responsibility. He’ll have to walk it, bathe it, feed it, tend to it when it’s sick, teach it proper manners, and he better be prepared to enjoy it.

And yeah, he’s aware that he now has a hand on another man’s dick, and in the same brainwave he is comparing them to Tim and Lassie, but what he’s getting at here is: he is prepared to grow some responsibility for himself, right now, because Steve matters.

He is not one of the parade of giggling blonde hookups Tony has enjoyed most of his adult life — slender or busty or both, and all of them meaningless, which is why he stopped with that altogether after a certain something, as vulnerable and exposing as the arc reactor, has been installed into his chest. Those girls were about sex, anyway, not about any sort of connection, and he’s fine with letting that go.

Steve is not Pepper either — Pepper, who is so rational she will do the thinking for the both of them and tell him in a gentle voice before it gets to any serious depth with them that she can see where this is going and it won’t be working out, because Pepper _understands_ him — perhaps better than he does himself.

And Tony realizes two things. One, Steve is moral and virtuous and giving up the goods is as big a deal for him as they go. And he has elected Tony to do the honors. No sentiment might have been declared between them, but the message is clear anyway. It is not a one-time spur-of-the-moment deal for Steve, and the thought unwraps something exultant and easy within him.

And it leads Tony to number two: Steve has no idea that for Tony it isn’t either. He’s ready to be in it for freaking life, till Asgardians do them part, or something more romantic than that. He’s never considered for Steve to become anything as shallow as a one-time-shag in his life. What Steve is for him, _means_ to him escapes definition by his lacking thesaurus that is barren when it comes to dealing with feelings.

Steve may not _understand_ Tony, but he **_gets_** him. He is always by his side, backing him up, trusting him, and this time Steve is trusting him with **_this_**. Tony may hate sappy sensitive talks and holding-hands kind of stuff, but this is Steve, the king of “Let’s-talk-this-over-first”, and he’s making an effort for Tony’s sake to not be talking about anything of the kind.

So, even though he has **_promised_** himself he’d sooner be caught in his office at _Stark Industries_ butt naked again than ask this infuriating question — because, really, if you’ve made it this far, you ought to have the bloody sense to own up to the debauchery that is happening in your pants — but Steve doesn’t have this sense worked out yet, so Tony asks. “Are you sure about this?”

And he’s rewarded by a grateful glance that is coyly hesitant and makes him feel like a Knight in a freaking Shining Armor, and he understands that Steve is sure and what he really wants to ask and get the answer to is, ‘Are you?’ He doesn’t ask, trusting that Tony’s gesture is enough for the both of them.

“I think there’s one vital part that we have missed,” Tony points out, and he is pulsating all over, he will need to come again, _soon_ , but he takes a deep breath and takes a step back from all this heat. And he kisses Steve, slowly, deeply, devouringly, gives him the best damn kiss of his life — because the fact that he had so many practice to perfect his skill may not recommend him in the commitment department, but at least he can make up for it by blowing Steve’s mind.

This time, when his hands drop to Steve’s waistband he meets no resistance. Tony smiles but doesn’t rush, prolonging the kiss. He pours everything he is into it — beyond any ‘impermeable façades’, all the affection and frustration, bitterness and humor, contentment and excitement, resolve and desire.

“Just so there’s no confusion,” he whispers against his mouth, licking it open as Steve moans, so that Tony’s tongue traces along the lower lip, jumps across the air and catches the upper lip, suckling on it, which spins them into fervent tongue-wrestling. Steve’s fingers are lost in Tony’s hair, and his hands are on Steve’s waist as he is cruising them blindly to some sort of fulcrum.

“Just so there’s no confusion,” he tries again, having lost the previous train of thought, “I am not in this for the sex,” he finishes ineloquently — but if anyone is expecting him to retain higher brain function in this position, they’re crazy. “I’m in this for you.” Not his most accomplished example of oratory, and the serious conversations where they will be figuring out everything that’s going one between them will come, but right now he gets the point across, as Steve makes a sound in his throat that might have been the beginning of an agreement, but is muffled by their tongues exploring each other ardently.

He finally manages to shove Steve against one of the tables, Tony’s naked thighs rubbing against fabric, and at last he gets Steve’s cock free — it jumps hot and eager and amazing into his hand. Tony yanks his pants and underwear down in one prompt jerk, leaving them dangling in between Steve’s ankles as he rushes to rise and wrap his hand around Steve’s cock, grinding it into his palm with solid pressure. He feels Steve shuffle as he kicks off his shoes and gets rid of all the unnecessary clothing until he’s just as stark naked, and he brings his own wide hand over Tony’s so they are stroking and tugging and grazing together, and then Steve can only thrust helplessly, swallowed by the perfect intensity of the moment.

He hardly makes a sound, not at all vocal like Tony is, all his moans coming choked-off, but his chest is expanding like wings, and he’s flushed and convulsing like a shockwave. The sight of him makes Tony’s cock rise up for the second round much faster than he has anticipated, his heart racing painfully fast like he’s burning on the inside, and he bucks his hips, bringing their pelvises together, dicks brushing eagerly. Their conjoined hands enclose both shafts in a tight prison of tangled fingers, working them franticly until he’s dizzy and his legs tremble, and he feels Steve shudder violently against him, as his breath hitches and his orgasm hits, spilling over their fingers. Steve sags against the table weekly and moans because Tony doesn’t let go, working them both, because he is so close, _almost, yes,_ eyes shut in a wince, his mouth full of gibbered disjointed words, and “Steve — yes — yessoperfect — fuck — now — _oh please I_ — ah-almost therefuck—”

And then the world explodes behind his eyelids.

 

 

***

 

“Can I see it _**now**_?” Tony says, interrupting the quietude of the room that has been filled with nothing but their panting for the last two minutes. He says it almost petulantly, like the past hour was about Steve’s holding him back from seeing the drawing alone, and not about the two of them being involved in a sexual marathon that left them both sprawled on the floor, breathless and exhausted.

Steve laughs, the irony not lost on him, the sound vibrating through his ribcage and echoing in Tony, making something shiver pleasurably inside of him. “Yeah,” he exhales, turning to the side, lips brushing over Tony’s jawline, before he gets up and grabs his pants.

He puts them on but doesn’t zip them, and Tony hides a smirk in his shoulder, grasping the meaning quite clearly — Steve expects the night to last. His heart thrums faster at the notion that he also expects it to last far past just one night.

Getting up as well, Tony doesn’t feel like parting with the nakedness that brought on this delicious denouement and merely grabs a towel from the furthest shelf, wrapping it around his hips.

Steve is standing by the table where he left the drawing, contemplating it again. This time, he’s not hesitant. His face is filled with beautiful contentment. He is filled with beauty. Turning around, he extends his arm, offering the finished piece to Tony. And Tony doesn’t like to be handed things, but tonight, when it’s Steve, when it’s **_this_** , he finds he doesn’t mind.

It’s charcoal over soft pencil. There’s an air of incompleteness about it — the background is blank, there are just strokes of black there; some of the lines are interrupted in places, others tend to reach over the horizon — but it’s not about the lines, not a sketch, not unfinished. It has everything that makes a drawing complete. It also has everything that makes it _Tony and Steve._

For all that it’s drawn in black, it’s not dark — it’s about light, playing over Tony’s skin, in his dark eyes that seem to be conveying every bit as much desire as he was feeling. And every line screams of just as much desire that Steve has breathed back into it — radiating through, blurrily half-concealed. Like the underlying feeling was water in a glass, and it got spilled over the drawing, soaking in under the black lines but visible nonetheless. It is no wonder Steve was reluctant to show it to him right away: he was probably still unsure of where this was heading, and the drawing would be too exposing. Well, no unsaid things between them now, Tony supposes.

“It’s _art_ ,” he says softly, turning to him. “It’s perfect.”

“It’s you,” Steve replies with a small smile, like it’s justification enough, and it should sound corny, because it’s Steve, whose freshest sentiments are from the forties, but because it’s Steve it also doesn’t — it’s affectionate and calming. And, Tony finds, he doesn’t mind this either.

Steve’s hand travels across his shoulder blades and Tony looks up at him. “I’m very glad we did this,” he says earnestly. Which is the flattest, most bland version of _I love you like a madman, today, and every day, and for the rest of the days,_ that he can squeeze out of himself. He will have to work on that.

Steve’s answering chuckle seems chiding, as if saying ‘If you can’t come up with a romantic declaration, maybe you ought to just shut up and stick to what you know’. Tony takes his silent advise and kisses him. He imagines he will be doing a lot of apology kissing for his verbal skills in the future, but he is quite alright with that.

“So,” he says, breaking the kiss and clearing his throat with theatric nonchalance, “my bed has an amazingly comfy matrass. I mean, eiderdown comforter. I’m just saying.”

“Tantalizing,” Steve agrees with an equally solemn face.

“But?” Tony arches an eyebrow.

“No ‘but’,” Steve smiles. “Although,” he recalls a few seconds later, “I would not be averse to you teaching me the advantages of taking combined showers.” His smile is quite smug for a man who claims to have no experience in this department whatsoever.

“Oh,” Tony drawls, tugging the towel tighter around his hips, “oh, you are on. I’ll race ya. And after I am through with you, no Vita-Ray will be enough to resuscitate you.”

Steve’s smile turns an even deeper shade of smug. Challenge accepted.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired, of all things, by one of those “Draw me like your French girls” memes. The one I saw wasn’t even in this fandom. And that's how one fandom with copious amount of hot men inspires me to write a fic in another fandom with the same qualities. Ah, the mysteries of my brain.
> 
> This is posted here in my attempt to take long-abandoned projects and finally conclude them. According to Word I started this on 29.05.12. So here's to finishing it upwards of a year later! :)


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